Chapter 172: Princess Serali Xuiven and Chapter 173: Change Targets

Chapter 172: Princess Serali Xuiven

Then a man stepped out of nothing.

Dark Lyehiran leathers.

One hand already reaching for her.

Serali’s magic snapped toward him.

Shadow closed around his wrist before his fingers reached her arm.

His expression barely changed. He had expected resistance.

Then the air folded again.

Beside the western lantern line.

Near the fountain.

Beyond the eastern approach.

Figures stepped out between breaths, scattered through the square rather than gathered in one place.

Four.

Seven.

Nine.

Twelve.

Gods.

The choir broke.

Someone screamed.

The man in front of Serali pulled against her shadow. “Princess Serali Xuiven.”

The name cracked across the square.

Not Lady Serali.

Not Royal Mage.

Princess.

Xuiven.

As though the last several months had never happened. As though the oath waiting in Verya’s hands did not exist.

“By command of King Vulmar, you are to return to Lyehira.”

Return.

Serali’s body knew the certainty in his voice.

Someone else deciding where she would go.

“No.”

The man’s other hand came up.

Silver-grey cord flashed between them.

Serali twisted. The weighted loop snapped closed where her shoulders had been.

Not a blade. Not a killing spell. A restraint.

Across the square, steel rang.

One of the new arrivals had appeared near the western route. Harrek’s Watch moved to close him off from the lantern path.

The Lyehiran drew his sword and slashed for the officer’s throat.

Another agent struck at the guards surrounding Allandra.

A third threw magic into the palace line between the family platform and Serali.

They were spreading the defenders.

Keeping them occupied.

Opening routes toward her.

A palace guard intercepted an agent near the eastern arch.

The Lyehiran drove his blade through the guard’s shoulder.

The man screamed.

Serali understood.

The cord came for her again.

They wanted her alive.

Everyone else was expendable.

The square broke.

People surged away from the lantern path.

A child screamed for her mother.

Someone knocked over a brazier.

A Lyehiran near the western line threw a bolt of blue-white magic at the guards closing on him.

One guard ducked.

The spell kept going.

It struck a festival stall. Wood exploded. A woman disappeared beneath it. Two people beside her went down.

The Lyehiran did not even look.

The lantern children screamed.

Serali turned.

The canopy was still overhead.

Beautiful.

Useless.

Not enough.

She dropped one hand.

Shadow plunged from its western edge.

The lattice changed.

Not vanished.

Changed.

The canopy remained suspended above the path while its outer weave thickened and dropped between the children and the fighting.

A curved wall of darkness struck the stones.

Lanternlight still shone through it.

“Behind it!” Serali shouted. “Get them behind it!”

Attendants moved.

The solemn little girl seized another child’s hand and dragged her with her.

An agent lunged toward the narrowing gap, not at the children, but through them, straight for Serali.

The shadow wall closed.

He struck it shoulder-first.

Rebounded.

Above them, the canopy flexed.

Below it, the lantern flames remained steady.

Even now.

Then Daravan shouted. “INNER RING!”

Steel cleared his scabbard.

“Protect the Queen! Plainclothes, reveal! Harrek, west! Pell, lantern line! Orran, east approach! Nobody shoots through those children!”

The festival peeled open.

Men and women who had been laughing among the crowd moments before threw back cloaks and drew weapons.

Watch officers emerged from the common square.

Palace guards tightened around Allandra.

Harrek was already moving. “North and south lanes! Get civilians out of the center!”

A Lyehiran came at him.

Harrek blocked once.

Twice.

Caught the man by the front of his leathers and drove his sword hilt into his stomach.

“Move!”

The Watch moved.

On the family platform, Hagen had not left Everly.

A Lyehiran engaged the guards at the foot of the stairs, trying to break through the royal line toward the center of the square.

Hagen stayed exactly where he was. One hand went behind him. Found Everly.

“Stay there.”

For once, she did not argue.

Amber-gold magic gathered around his other hand as the guards held the stairs.

He did not go to them.

He did not leave Everly.

Across the path, one of Allandra’s guards went down.

His sword skidded across the stones.

Allandra caught it before the Lyehiran could kick it away.

Sunlight ran down the borrowed steel.

The attacker hesitated.

Only a moment.

Enough.

Allandra met his next strike and drove him back toward her guards.

Serali saw the flash of gold.

Saw Allandra still standing.

Then the silver-grey cord tightened around her wrist.

Pain ripped through Serali’s shoulder.

Her feet slid.

“Princess.”

“No.”

“Your father commands your return.”

“My father commands many things.”

She wrapped shadow around the cord. “Most of them are stupid.”

Serali yanked.

The man came forward. She released the line.

His momentum carried him off balance.

Shadow struck him across the ribs.

Not enough.

He twisted with it.

Recovered.

Fast.

Another agent came from Serali’s right.

Daravan intercepted him.

Steel rang.

A weighted net opened above Serali.

She threw up both hands.

Shadow caught it.

The net closed around darkness instead of her body.

Serali flung it sideways.

Daravan appeared beside her. “Move.”

“I am moving.”

“Toward me.”

“That was not specified.”

A blade came at Daravan from the left.

Serali caught the attacker’s elbow in shadow.

Daravan pivoted and drove his sword hilt beneath the man’s jaw.

The attacker folded.

“Alive!” Daravan shouted.

Two guards descended on him.

Serali stared. “You want prisoners already?”

“I wanted prisoners before they arrived.”

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The next blade came high.

Daravan caught it.

Another Lyehiran slipped behind the demonstration structures.

Serali did not see him.

Marielle did.

Pell had been pulled several paces away, blocking an agent from reaching the lantern line. The other man used the rig as cover and moved around the back of it toward Serali.

Marielle’s hand closed around one of the release ropes.

She pulled.

The support bar pivoted down.

It caught the Lyehiran across the shoulders and drove him to the stones beneath wood and canvas.

Marielle blinked. “Useful.”

Then Serali cried out.

The leader had gotten around Daravan.

His hand closed over Serali’s injured shoulder and twisted her backward against him.

White pain burst behind her eyes.

Her concentration broke.

Not completely.

Enough.

She drove her elbow into his ribs.

His grip tightened.

Something dark appeared between his fingers.

A needle.

Serali saw it moving toward her neck.

Too late.

Marielle’s hand disappeared into her dress.

Brass flashed.

Crack.

The gear struck the leader directly beneath the eye.

His head snapped sideways.

The needle scraped past Serali’s neck without touching her.

His grip loosened. Serali tore free.

Shadow hit him squarely in the chest. He went backward and struck the stones.

The brass gear rolled after him.

Once.

Twice.

Stopped.

Serali stared at it.

Then at Marielle.

Marielle lowered her throwing hand. “Pocket.”

Of course.

Blood appeared beneath the leader’s eye.

He touched it.

Looked at his fingers.

Then at Marielle.

His expression changed.

Fury.

He moved.

Straight for her.

“Marielle!”

Pell saw him coming. He crossed between them.

The first strike rang against Pell’s sword.

The second drove him sideways.

The leader slipped past.

Marielle backed away.

“Move!” Pell shouted.

She ducked the first slash.

The second caught her upper arm.

Fabric split.

Blood followed.

Marielle staggered.

Serali saw the blade clearly as it passed.

Narrow.

Dark.

A shallow groove running down its center almost to the point.

Then—

“MARIELLE!”

Daravan.

His voice tore across the square.

Serali had never heard him say her name like that.

Her magic reacted before thought. Shadow slammed into the leader.

Hard.

He left the ground.

Hit the stones.

Rolled.

Pell reached Marielle and pulled her behind him.

Marielle clamped one hand over her upper arm. Blood was already slipping between her fingers.

She looked down at it. Then up. “That was my writing arm.”

“Stay with Pell,” Serali snapped.

For once, Marielle did not argue.

Across the square, someone shouted.

Serali turned.

Another attack.

Another net.

Another blade.

The fight had not stopped because Marielle was bleeding.

Of course it had not.

Her body remained angled between the leader and Marielle.

The leader’s anger faded. Something colder took its place.

Interest.

Serali did not notice.

Another attacker was already coming for her.

Daravan blocked the blade.

Serali caught the man’s wrist.

Back to back.

For one strange heartbeat, Daravan’s shoulder pressed against hers.

Several months ago, he had chained her to a wall.

Questioned her.

Hurt her.

Now his sword guarded the space her shadows could not reach, and her magic closed around the man trying to put a blade through his ribs.

There was probably something profound in that.

She was too busy to find it.

“Right,” Daravan said.

“I see him.”

“You weren’t looking.”

“I have shadows.”

“Then use them.”

Serali did.

The attacker went down.

Another spell flashed toward Daravan.

Serali shoved him sideways with shadow. It struck the pillar behind him hard enough to crack stone.

Daravan looked at the damage.

Then at her.

“I had that.”

“No, you didn’t.”

Across the lantern path, the leader watched.

Serali had protected the children.

Then the Royal Engineer.

Now the Captain.

Once could be instinct.

Twice could be circumstance.

Three times—

His gaze shifted toward the family platform.

Toward the Queen.

Toward the little princess crouched behind Prince Hagen.

And he kept watching.

At the healer station, Lia looked up.

Her gaze found Marielle.

The torn sleeve.

The hand pressed to her arm.

The blood.

For one heartbeat, she went completely still.

Then she ran.

Chapter 173: Change Targets

Lia ran.

Not blindly.

Serali saw the difference immediately.

The square was chaos; steel, smoke, screaming civilians, overturned lantern stands, but Lia moved through it as though chaos had rules.

She waited half a heartbeat for a palace guard to engage the Lyehiran between her and Marielle.

Crossed behind him.

Changed direction before a spell struck the stones where she had been.

Duck.

Turn.

Keep moving.

No weapon.

No attack magic.

Nothing wasted on pretending she was a soldier.

She knew exactly what she was.

A healer trying to reach a patient in the middle of a battlefield.

And apparently this was not the first battlefield that had tried to stop her.

Another Lyehiran moved into her path.

Pell was too far away.

Serali threw shadow.

It wrapped around the man’s ankle and ripped his feet from beneath him.

Lia stepped over him without slowing.

Reached Marielle.

Caught her by the shoulders.

“Sit.”

“I can stand.”

“Sit.”

Something in Lia’s voice apparently overrode even Marielle.

She sat.

Pell moved in front of them, sword raised.

Lia dropped to her knees. “Move your hand.”

Marielle looked down at the fingers pressed over her upper arm. “I think that may be inadvisable.”

“Marielle.”

She moved it.

Lia peeled the torn fabric back.

Her expression changed.

Only slightly.

Serali would not have noticed if she had not been watching.

The cut ran across the outside of Marielle’s upper arm.

Deep enough to bleed.

Not—

Lia pressed a folded cloth over it.

Hard.

Marielle hissed.

“Pressure.”

“You are applying pressure.”

“More.”

Marielle obediently put her hand over Lia’s.

Lia looked at the blood already soaking the torn sleeve. “How long has it been bleeding like this?”

Marielle frowned. “Since he cut me.”

Lia’s mouth tightened. “Look at me.”

“I am.”

“Any dizziness?”

“A little.”

“How little?”

Marielle considered.

Lia snapped, “This is not a measurement exercise.”

“Moderate.”

“Better.”

Serali caught the leader moving in her peripheral vision.

She turned.

He had gotten back to his feet.

Blood ran from the cut beneath his eye where Marielle’s gear had struck him.

He was still watching.

He saw as Lia ran for Marielle. He saw as Serali protected the healer’s path.

The leader’s expression settled.

There it was again.

He had seen enough.

He barked two words in Naeric. “Change targets.”

Serali’s stomach dropped.

The Lyehirans moved.

And this time—

they moved away from her.

One man who had been forcing palace guards back from the center abruptly turned toward the family platform.

Another abandoned the eastern approach and raised his hand toward Allandra.

A third wheeled toward the noble pavilion.

Someone near the lantern line turned his blade toward the children behind Serali’s shield.

Another sent blue-white magic into the fleeing crowd.

Not through them.

At them.

Serali understood.

Before, they had been clearing paths.

Holding guards away from her.

Creating openings.

Now—

“No.”

Her shadows split.

The wall around the children thickened.

Another strand shot toward the crowd.

Another caught the wrist of the Lyehiran turning toward Lia.

Too many.

Too far.

At the noble pavilion, a hand came up.

Magic struck one of the support posts.

Wood cracked.

“Down!” Verya shouted.

The pavilion lurched.

Yvander seized an elderly lord by the shoulders and dragged him behind the stone rail as a support beam crashed through two rows of chairs.

People screamed.

Verya dropped.

Splintered wood flew overhead.

Something sliced across her palm. She barely looked at it.

“Behind the rail!” Yvander ordered. “Everyone down!”

For once, no one objected to being commanded by the Minister of Granaries.

A young noblewoman stood frozen beside an overturned chair.

Merrow caught her sleeve and hauled her down a heartbeat before another bolt tore through the space where her head had been.

She stared at him.

Merrow stared back. “Please reserve your gratitude until we are no longer being murdered.”

Then Verya saw the oath. The leather folder had fallen beyond the rail. Out in the open.

She stared at it.

Merrow followed her gaze. “No.”

“I did not say anything.”

“You were thinking about it.”

“It is legally significant.”

“It will remain legally significant while lying there.”

Another blast struck the pavilion. Verya ducked lower.

Fine.

Serali being alive to swear it was considerably more important.

At the pavilion steps, Harrek blocked a Lyehiran’s sword.

High.

Low.

Again.

A second attacker came from his blind side.

Someone shouted a warning.

Harrek turned.

Not quickly enough.

The pommel caught him across the temple.

His head snapped sideways.

He went down to one knee.

Blood appeared immediately at his hairline.

Verya stayed exactly where she was. Going into the fight would accomplish one thing: Give Harrek another civilian to protect.

A Watch officer hit the attacker from the side.

Harrek pushed himself upright.

Wiped the blood away.

Then roared, “Close the west gap!”

The Watch obeyed.

On the eastern side of the square, magic struck the stones in front of the palace household.

Callene caught Mara and dragged her down.

Lessa went with them.

Heat washed overhead.

A maid screamed and fell.

Mara pushed herself up.

Serali saw her turn toward the lantern path.

Toward her.

Callene caught her wrist. “Mara.”

“Let go.”

“No.”

“I need to get to her. That’s my lady!”

Callene’s face changed. “I know.”

Another spell hit nearby.

A maid went down beside the stone planter.

Callene released Mara only to seize the woman beneath one arm. Mara took the other without being asked. Together they dragged her behind cover.

Lessa looked toward the family platform. Everly was still there. Still with Hagen.

There were perhaps twenty paces between them.

Might as well have been a mile.

A Lyehiran crossed the gap.

Then another.

The route vanished.

Lessa crouched lower beside the servants.

At the lantern line, the attacker Serali had pulled away from Lia got back to his feet.

This time he did not turn toward Serali.

He went for Lia and Marielle.

Pell intercepted. Steel rang inches from where Lia knelt.

Marielle flinched.

Lia did not look up. “Keep pressure.”

“I am.”

“More.”

“I only have one hand on it.”

“Then use it better.”

Pell drove the attacker away.

Another spell flashed toward them. Serali caught it in shadow.

The impact shook through her arm.

The canopy trembled.

So did the shield around the children.

On the family platform, Hagen saw two Lyehirans coming.

Not toward the guards. Toward Everly.

His expression changed. “Stay behind me.”

Everly obeyed. Her hands caught the back of his coat.

One attacker came from the left. The second took the platform stairs.

Hagen did not move more than a step.

Amber-gold magic gathered around his hands.

The first sword struck.

Hagen caught it against a narrow flare of heat.

Steel glowed.

The man recoiled.

Hagen drove his fist into his throat.

The second came low.

Hagen turned—

never far enough to expose Everly—

caught the man’s wrist and twisted.

The knife hit the platform.

Hagen kicked it over the edge.

The first man recovered.

Everly made a tiny sound behind him.

Hagen’s magic struck the attacker squarely in the chest.

He flew backward into the rail.

Hagen stepped back immediately.

Everly’s hands found his coat again.

“Still there?”

“Yes.”

“Good.”

Across the square, the Lyehiran moving toward Allandra ignored the guard directly between them.

He went around him.

For her.

Allandra saw it.

The borrowed sword came up.

Steel met steel.

One strike.

Two.

Allandra turned the third aside and drove him backward.

He recovered fast.

Slashed toward her middle.

Sunlight surged down her blade.

The Mantle answered. Gold-white light burst beneath her skin.

For one heartbeat, something vast opened behind her.

Wings.

Not feathered.

Not entirely solid.

Sunfire shaped into great arcs from her shoulders.

Light plated itself across her chest and arms.

The borrowed sword lengthened in her hand beyond its own steel.

The attacker recoiled.

So did civilians nearby.

Allandra felt it.

Serali could see the exact moment she did.

Too much power. Too many people.

Everly behind Hagen.

Guards at her shoulders.

Civilians packed beyond the line.

Allandra crushed the magic down.

The wings vanished before they fully opened.

The armor dissolved.

Only the sword remained blazing.

Control.

The Lyehiran came again.

The Lyehiran came again.

Allandra knocked his weapon aside and struck him across the temple with the pommel.

He dropped.

“Alive,” she ordered.

Her guards took him.

Allandra turned immediately toward the lantern path.

Serali was still standing. That should have been enough.

It was not.

Shadow moved everywhere around her.

Over the children.

Across the square.

Around Daravan.

Toward the pavilion.

Too many directions.

Allandra could feel the strain even through the partitions in the bond.

Fear pressed against them.

Pain.

Fury.

Serali.

Every instinct in Allandra’s body demanded the same thing.

Go.

Cross the square.

Open the Mantle.

Burn everything between them to ash.

She could.

That was the worst part.

If this square were empty; if there were no children beneath Serali’s shadows, no civilians packed behind the barriers, no guards fighting at arm’s reach, Allandra could stop pretending that the light beneath her skin was the extent of what she carried.

She could open her wings.

She could let the sword become sunfire.

She could make every Lyehiran in the square regret stepping into Avalusia.

But the square was not empty.

Everly was behind Hagen.

Her people were everywhere.

And unlike the men attacking them, Allandra cared who stood between herself and her target.

So she stayed.

The decision felt like tearing something out of herself.

Daravan had given her the protocol. She had approved it.

The Queen did not abandon her position in the middle of an attack.

The Queen did not force her own guards to chase after her.

The Queen did not turn herself into another person who needed protecting.

Allandra knew all of that.

She hated every word.

Then silver-grey cord snapped around Serali’s wrist.

Allandra moved.

One step.

The Mantle surged with her.

Gold flooded beneath her skin.

The guard nearest her saw. “Your Majesty.”

Allandra stopped.

Across the path, Daravan was already turning.

Already going to Serali.

Serali was still standing.

Trust him.

Allandra’s hand clenched around the borrowed sword.

Trust her.

The light beneath her skin burned.

She forced it down.

The fact that restraint was correct did not make it feel any less like betrayal.

Someone screamed near the fountain.

Serali’s head snapped toward it.

Shadow moved before thought.

Then the children.

Then Lia.

Daravan—

A blade came for his ribs.

Serali caught the attacker’s wrist.

Another spell went toward the household.

She threw shadow.

Too late.

It struck stone instead of flesh, but fragments exploded across the servants.

Someone cried out.

The pavilion.

Everly.

Allandra.

Marielle.

Everywhere.

Serali’s magic stretched until it felt like threads being pulled through her bones.

“Serali!”

Daravan.

She turned.

Too late.

Silver-grey cord snapped around her wrist.

The leader pulled.

Serali stumbled.

“You wanted me,” she spat.

“We still do.”

“Then fight me.”

His mouth curved. “Why?”

Across the square another crash sounded.

Serali looked.

His smile widened. “There.”

“What?”

“Every time.” He jerked the cord. “You look.”

Serali wrapped shadow around it.

“Every time someone screams.”

Another pull.

“You divide your magic.”

The lantern shield flickered.

“Every person they threaten.”

A child cried.

Serali’s shadow moved toward the sound.

“You leave yourself open.”

“Then stop threatening them.”

“Come willingly.”

“No.”

The answer was immediate.

“No one else needs to be hurt.”

“You are hurting them.”

“Because you resist.”

The words landed.

Perfectly.

Serali stopped breathing.

The square remained around her.

Lanterns.

Steel.

Smoke.

But another room existed beneath it.

Stone walls.

Locked doors.

Vandra’s voice. Why do you insist on making this difficult?

The leader pulled.

Serali took one step toward him.

“You know how this works.”

Her stomach turned.

“You force us to use greater measures.”

Another step.

“They protect you.”

Marielle’s blood.

“They bleed for you.”

Harrek on one knee.

“You could stop it.”

Everly hidden behind Hagen.

“All you have to do is obey.”

The shadow canopy flickered.

Once.

The leader saw.

His voice softened. “Enough people have been hurt for you.”

No.

Because of her.

They had come because of her.

Marielle had—

“Serali.”

Daravan.

She could not look at him.

“They came for me.”

“Yes.”

Her eyes snapped toward him.

He was fighting another Lyehiran.

Sword against sword.

“Yes,” Daravan repeated. “They did.”

Not denial.

Not reassurance.

Fact.

Serali’s throat tightened.

“They’re hurting people because I won’t go.”

“No.”

The leader pulled the cord again.

Daravan knocked his attacker’s blade aside.

“They’re hurting people because they chose to hurt them.”

Marielle on the stones.

“She—”

“He cut her.”

Daravan struck again.

“Harrek—”

“They hit him.”

Another scream.

Serali flinched.

Daravan drove the attacker back.

“They came armed. They cast into civilians. They made those choices.”

The leader yanked. Serali lost her footing.

Daravan moved.

Another Lyehiran crossed between them.

Daravan hit him once.

Twice.

Got past.

“You didn’t bring them here.”

He reached Serali.

“You didn’t give the order.”

His sword flashed. The cord parted.

The severed end fell to the stones.

“You didn’t choose any of this.”

Serali staggered backward.

Daravan stepped into the space between them.

His sword remained raised.

“You do not owe them obedience for violence they chose.”

The old answer was still there.

Deep.

Automatic.

Obey.

The leader held out one hand. “You can end this, Princess.”

Serali looked at him.

Then at Marielle.

At the children.

At Everly.

At Allandra.

At Daravan standing between her and the man who had tried to drag her away.

Something inside her steadied.

“So can you.”

The leader went still. “Come with us.”

“No.” Shadow curled around Serali’s hands. “You don’t get to use their pain to choose for me.”

For the first time, his smile disappeared.

Then it returned. Smaller. Crueler.

“You learned new words.”

The old instinct told Serali to shrink.

To apologize.

To be quiet.

She didn’t.

“Yes.” Her shadow tightened.

“I did.”